THE LORD CLYDE: GETTING THE PUB BASICS RIGHT

A few years ago, when I had a real job and worked just off the Essex Road, I used to occasionally take the long route home to get an added bit of exercise. My walk would take me towards the Balls Pond Road and past what always looked to me like one of the roughest boozers in London, Kendrick’s. It was the sort of place where they think you are slightly suspect if you have your own teeth. I actually popped in once out of curiosity. Unsurprisingly, I wasn’t made particularly welcome and slunk back out again after finishing half a pint of gassy, bad beer.

Once I departed publishing (three years ago at the beginning of March if can you believe it) my commute shortened from a mile or so to the time it took to walk from the bedroom to my sofa. I had no reason to ever pass the pub again since I left the office for the last time and had not given it a second thought in the intervening years.

It was HP who first informed me that things had changed since my last visit. Our current pub of choice, The Old Fountain, is unfortunately one of those that is closed at the weekend and, one evening, when we were both desperate for a Saturday evening pint, he recalled that a local pub, The Lord Clyde had just been awarded “Best Overall Pub” by that excellent website Fancy A Pint

It was not until we turned the corner onto the Essex Road that I realised the pub was actually Kendrick’s refurbished and re-badged. The new owners had not done a bad job either obviously spending at a lot of time, in the two or so years they had owned the place, quietly getting the basics right rather than trumpeting themselves as the second coming of British cuisine like so many of the new generation of gastropubs. Although they served food, The Lord Clyde (run in conjunction with Enterprise Inns, who also work with The Harwood Arms) still felt like a real pub rather than a restaurant with a small bar area.

We had two pints each of very well kept real ale and almost inevitably a scotch egg and bowl of pork scratchings to go with them. There was enough about the beer, the friendly service and the bar snacks to make us note down The Lord Clyde as a pub for further DH attention. When I had the sort of gap in my stomach yesterday that could only be filled with a decent pint and a pub lunch, I decided to walk up and give them another try.

The bar is sizable and, but for the fact it is filled with comfortable chairs and the glow from a real fireplace, could look a little austere. The landlord being a Sussex boy, told me, that he always makes sure they have Harvey’s as one of their real ales and he slowly dispensed the perfect, full pint for me. Unlike HP who dislikes jugs (no sniggering at the back) I am ambivalent about what receptacle pubs serve my beer in, it is usually gone quickly enough for the glass shape not to matter. This pint certainly went down well enough vanishing almost before I had moved to a table to wait for my food.

The menu at The Lord Clyde is pleasingly short and very well priced focusing on “pub grub’ staples that can be done quickly and well to help punters soak up good beer rather than trying to be a fine dining experience. It’s a smart move, one more pubs could follow and a short while after I sat down with my paper, my lunch was popped in front of me.

Even though I am still digesting a whole heap of dead cow from Monday’s Blokes Eat Beef event I was tempted by the hamburger. It arrived with an accompanying bowl of chips and a side order of onion rings. The hamburger was not bad at all. Made with good beef, given a char from the grill and served on a decent bun, which soaked up the juices, which dribbled from the patty.

The owners of The Lord Clyde are obviously not interested in the current “Best Burger in London” conversation and, as with the beer, are just concentrating on getting the basics right. On the whole they achieve their aim, even putting aside my own bugbear wanting my food served on a plate rather than on a plank of wood. The advertised slice of Cheddar was a bit on the miserly side and the chips, despite being of the ubiquitous “tripled-cooked” variety were soft and floury and, obviously way, way too fat.

It is the onion rings however, which should be singled out for real praise. These are some of the best I have eaten, well just about anywhere. Grease free crunchy batter (made with Harvey’s Bitter and cold soda water) gave way to soft, sweet onions in a display of perfect deep frying that would make me want to head back to The Lord Clyde just to order a plate of these to go with my beer.

As it is, I am sure I shall be making the effort to walk up to The Lord Clyde again soon. There are all too few pubs in London offering a full pint of great beer along with a short food menu of competently prepared standards. Other pubs which aim higher with considerably more hubris would do well to take note.

EATING FOR BRITAIN: LONDON PRIDE HAS BEEN HANDED DOWN TO US

The EATING FOR BRITAIN trip is coming to its end and with just a handful of visits to go I think I can safely say that I have given it my best shot at finding some of the fantastic foods and amazing producers we have on offer in the U.K.

I am also aware that I have been very, very fortunate and that, while people could and probably should have been quite wary of a strange, plump bald man turning up on the doorstep and prodding about their business, they have, almost universally, been incredibly welcoming and more than happy to show me around. Not only that, I have also been given privileged access to places that under normal circumstances I would only have dreamed of seeing and been given the opportunity to taste stuff that under normal circumstances, I would never have had the opportunity to try.

I kept this in mind as John Keeling, for the last ten years, the Brewing Director of Fuller’s Brewery took two hours of his incredibly valuable time to show me around the brewery and take me through a tasting of some of their vintage beers and the much sought after “Brewer’s Reserve”

There are few weekends that pass without HP and I downing a couple of pints of London Pride at The Artillery Arms near Old St. It remains one of our favourite pints, great flavours from the malt and hops, but also noticeable for its dependable consistency, which is a major factor in the oft futile search in London for a decent pint.

There has been brewing on the famous site in Chiswick for almost 350 years, but Fuller, Smith and Turner, as it is still know, has been brewing there since 1845. There have been considerable changes in that time, not least in the 1970’s when many breweries were ditching their cask ale production in favour of keg beers, which were seen as the future. Fuller’s Brewery made the then brave decision to keep making cask ales and turned down the opportunity to move to an out of town site in favour of spending a great deal of money on revamping their historical location. It paid dividends and now they are one of the few remaining breweries in the capital.

With London Pride being so prevalent in London Pubs, it is easy to mistake Fuller’s for one of the giant brewing companies, but John put it into perspective when he told me that, although they brew 220,000 barrels, that is only about a third of what other regional brewers like Greene King can churn out and a fraction of the 6 million barrels produced by super brewers like Carling. This relative small scale gives Fuller’s the chance to retain a certain amount of innovation and they now produce about twenty beers a year including their “reserves” and their seasonal ales.

John gave me the tour of the brewing house and, although I have seen many over the last couple of years, the individuality of each one always comes through. Here at Fuller’s it was great to see that while computers and mechanisation were obviously very much to the fore, there were still plenty of aspects, which depend on the skill of the brewer and his team. As if to prove a point, after the tour, we returned to John’s office and he showed one of the Fuller’s Brewery books. This weighty, leather bound book contains all the daily recipes dating back over one hundred years and, along with the daily notes from the brewer also showed the exact mixes of each beer down to the type of malt and hops.

The issues discussed in the books, scarcity of hops, problems with malting, failure of machines etc may have happened over a century ago, but when John had to deal with the leaking of fermentation tank, while I was there, you could see that precious little has changed in that time.

Tours are one things, but the proof is in the tasting, so after we left John’s office, we headed down to the “Hock Cellar” where barrels of beer used to be stored as they conditioned, to have a tasting in the smart new Fuller’s bar. John poured me a glass of their “Vintage Ale” a relatively new idea where they are taking one making a year, using the very best ingredients that have been supplied to them and making a limited amount of ale to be conditioned in the bottle and sold at a premium price. It is good, but powerful stuff coming in at a whopping 8.5% and half a glass left me swaying as I came blinking into the sunlight as John saw me off.

I made one last stop at their impressive new shop and then began the long walk back to Turnham Green tube station. On my way, I passed the George IV a Fuller’s pub. Well, it just had to be done. I popped inside and ordered a pint of London Pride. It was a good pour, no sparkler to knock all the Co2 out of the beer and a full measure. I sat outside in the Sun, sipping on my pint and making some notes. What could be better? I would like to say that my visit made the beer taste different, but of course it didn’t. It tasted like it always tastes, great. A very dependable pint and something that Fuller’s Brewery and London should be very, er proud of.

THE GREAT BRITISH BEER FESTIVAL: THE HAPPIEST DAY OF THE YEAR

It’s the one day of the year that both of DH look forward to more than any other.

For the last few years, we have made sure that the Thursday of The Great British Beer Festival is our day and plan our schedule accordingly with HP taking the day off work and me planning my writing schedule so that this day, and for obvious reasons, the following day are set aside from our normal affairs so we can indulge our love for the very best beer Britain has to offer.

If seems, looking at the numbers, that many others have marked the Thursday down as their special day at the GBBF too and, when we arrived, there were already hundreds of people milling about waiting for Earls Court to open and figuring out which of the queues to join. We added to the numbers by one, by allowing our small, fat, four-eyed and slightly simple friend, Paul to join us as a temporary extra Hermano and, while he went off to join the queue for those without pre-paid tickets, we joined the already sizeable queue of those who had booked online.

Once the festival opened, the queue moved quickly enough to allow HP and I to be two halves of mild to the good before Paul wandered in. Of course, while we were drinking said halves, we had to convey the fact to Paul through regular text messages and phone calls to add insult to his considerable injury.

Finally, when he managed to find his way to the hall, we made our way to join the queue for the Champion Beer of 2009, Rudgate Ruby Mild from North Yorkshire. We always stick to mild, a great session beer and weak enough that we can drink it through the day without falling over half an hour after we arrive. The champion beer was fine, but far from our favourite as we made our way around the parts of the hall representing different areas, with perhaps the Oakleaf Mild from the South-West winning our vote.

What did not win our vote however was the food. In years past, the food has been a simple affair with a few stalls selling pies, sausage rolls and, of course stupidly large bags of scratchings. They are still there, thank God, but in an attempt, no doubt, to attract the ladies, who were there in much increased numbers from previous years, there was a wider and more corporate feel to the food stalls, with some really dreadful offerings including a fish & chips stand with the worst looking examples of the genre I have ever seen outside of an Iceland supermarket.

Some things, however have remained untouched, the sight of the larger gentleman wearing stupid headgear, entertainment provided by people you know but have not heard of for years (in this case, fabulous rock violinist Mick Kaminski, once of ELO) and of course the fact that at some point in the early afternoon, HP utters the fateful words “let’s go and have some cider”

The cider stand is a dangerous place and once you go there, there is no going back. The lovely buzz from a few glasses of mild being replaced by the psychotic haze that only comes with apples fermented until they reach a wicked alcohol level and the bar becoming a means of support for the body rather than a resting place for the glass.

It also signals that our time at The Great British Beer Festival is almost over for one more year as, after a few more halves, we collect our clean commemorative glasses and stagger out into streets squinting in the daylight and saddened by the fact that, although in the hall, there is some of the best beer anywhere in the world on offer, outside you would be hard pushed to find a pub within a half mile that could offer a decent pint.

A down note on which to end perhaps, but one of the precious few on what is and, I suspect shall remain, DH’s happiest day of the year

Roll on 2010

THE BREE LOUISE: ANOTHER PUB IN A STICKY SITUATION

In today’s Guardian Word of Mouth blog, I contributed a post about the rapid decline in the numbers of pubs in the UK, at the rate of over 50 a week.

Unsurprisingly it has drawn quite a response, many agreeing with my own argument that, although there are lots of factors that make running a pub very hard and indeed close to impossible, the main reason that so many pubs are closing is that, even if their product is OK, some are simply really horrible places in which to spend time.

As if to prove the point, on Saturday, HP and I went for one of our regular pub sessions and decided to search for somewhere as an alternative to our usual locals, The Artillery Arms and The Wenlock Arms.

HP had been reading about The Bree Louise, a small pub close to Euston Station. It had just won CAMRA North London Pub of The Year and was notable not only for its award but also for the fact that, as well as hand pulled beers, it is one of the few in the city that also dispenses beer using gravity. Beers are jacketed in covers that maintain cellar temperature and allow the pub to store them behind the bar keeping a wider range.

All very promising and, indeed, as we walked into the pub, the sight of the bar with its casks on display, a blackboard with a long list of real ales and cask ciders and the price list, increasing with ABV made us think that The Bree Louise would be a great place to spend the evening.

That is until we began to walk across the room, our feet sticking to the sticky carpet. It was not the only thing that was sticky, in fact everything in the Bree Louise appears to stick to everything else. There was only one young man behind the bar dealing with both the hand pulled beers and the gravity dispensed. He was rushed off his feet and had not had time to collect the empty pots, which littered the tables. I tried to help by clearing the empties from our own high table and placed them on the bar where they remained for the rest of our stay.

If you believe that pubs are just delivery systems for beer, then the range at The Bree Louise might persuade you to stay. However, even though the two pints we sampled were well kept and delivered in a full measure, the general state of the pub was so grim that we felt no desire to linger. And, after one visit to the toilets, which would made the Black Hole of Calcutta look like Pontins, we decided to head back to The Artillery Arms where, the beer may not win awards, but a perfectly decent pint is served in a welcoming environment.

There seems to be a fallacy that, just because you are

a) Male
b) A real ale drinker

you don’t care about the environment in which you drink. While HP and I certainly visit pubs primarily for their beer rather than for their jukebox, certain basic standards have to be maintained and, the truth is too many pubs just fail to meet them to a level that will persuade even those in search of a great pint to linger.

If you want to know why pubs are closing at such a rapid rate, go for a drink at The Bree Louise. It will be a great pint, but I bet you wont stay for two.

EATING FOR BRITAIN: DRINKING BADGERS IN DORSET

Just to the East of Carnaby St, on Gaston Street is a small pub called The Shaston Arms. It is one of the best in London, not for its décor, which is a rather shabby attempt recreating a rural Dorset pub (the name is the local slang for Shaftesbury), not for it’s service, which can be, shall we say a little brusque, but for one reason alone, its beer.

The Shaston Arms is a tied pub, one of the 200+ owned by Dorset brewery, Hall & Woodhouse and, if you want a perfect pint in the capital, served at the correct temperature and in the full measure, then I suggest you head there and indulge yourself in a pint of Badger.

Beer is obviously going to be a huge part of the EATING FOR BRITAIN story. We are, unlike so many other things, damn good at making it and have in this country a growing number of brewers of excellent beers.

I had already taken the opportunity to visit one of my favourite small-scale breweries in the form of Thornbridge in Derbyshire and now wanted to visit one of the more sizable ones. So, when the invitation came to visit the brewery of Hall & Woodhouse in Blandford St Mary,Dorset, I leapt at the chance, not just because I was already such a fan of their beers, but also because, unlike so many other large scale companies, Hall & Woodhouse remain in the same family hands as the day they began in the late 1700’s and have managed to compete without the more vile elements of the corporate drinks giants.

I have visited many breweries in my time, but the Hall & Woodhouse site is easily one of the most memorable. A traditional Victorian brewery building on the same site for well over a hundred years, it was originally powered by a glorious steam engine, still in perfect working order, but now only fired up a couple of times a year.

The steam engine would life the malted barley to the top of the four-storey building and then gravity would be left to do the rest of the work. Nowadays, while their method of lifting to the top floor may be more modern, the rest is still very much as it was on the day the brewery was built.

Head Brewer, Toby Heasman gave me the tour, climbing flights of stone stairs to the top and following the beer down through its mashing and fermentation and finally to casking or bottling. It is all standard stuff, the same as just about any other brewery anywhere, but with beautiful old equipment still very much in use, it remains something that always gives me pleasure.

None of this would matter, of course, if the beer sucked and there was no way they were going to let me go without doing a full sampling. Alongside their well-known beers, Hall & Woodhouse produce a staggering number of bottled ales.

Not all of them worked for me and beers like “Blandford Fly” (with ginger and maple syrup) made me recoil in terror as did one made with nettles grown at The River Cottage and brewed in co-operation with St Hugh. Others, however, particularly the three times hopped “Hopping Hare” are simply a delight, with the hops added at different stages to give bitterness, aroma and of course, flavour. It is a stunning seasonal beer and one of the best I have tasted this year so far.

Best of all, however, it was good to see the attention to detail given to the brew that I already knew. Badger First Gold is an easy drinking 4% beer, the perfect session beer with a perfect balance of malt and hops. There are few beers I enjoy more when I get the chance and, if you have not yet had the pleasure. Pop across to The Shaston Arms, you wont regret it

THORNBRIDGE: FANCY A BREW?

Well, of course, my main reason to head up North last week was to spend time with my adoring family. They love me so no one else has to. But, the fact that Alex Buchanan, marketing guru for Thornbridge brewery had invited me to spend a day with them watching the magical transformation of malt, hops, yeast and water into falling down juice, was an added incentive.

Despite the sheeting rain, Thornbridge Hall is an impressive place set in over one hundred acres of land and the small brewery area at the back was already buzzing with activity as three of the brewers were hard at work.

Thornbridge brewery is owned in part by Jim Harrison, resident at the hall, and in part by Dave Wickett, the man behind of one of my favourite Northern beer makers, Kelham Island and they have taken on a young team to make their range of beers with each member barely more than thirty years old.

Despite their youth, their dedication and attention to detail is something to watch and it wasn’t long before, with cup of tea in hand obviously, I was watching Matthew Clark, a former Chef, cleaning casks for racking off the conditioned beer, Stefano Cossi, a food technologist from Italy, peering at yeast strains through the lens of a microscope and, David Pickering, the most experienced and travelled brewer, rubbing hops between his hands to release the oils before choosing the perfect mix for the daily brew.

They only make one ten barrel batch a day, but the fact they brew five times a week has allowed them to create a wide range of beers including the strong Jaipur IPA (available at Waitrose, beer fans) Kipling, another IPA, but made in the style more common in New Zealand and Halcyon, another IPA, but one where fresh hops are added to the beer in the conditioning tanks rather than during mashing to give a fantastic fruity aroma.

It’s all good stuff. Very good in fact, but my beer of choice is their remarkable Saint Petersburg Imperial Russian Stout, which packs a punch at nearly 8% but has a deliciously smooth chocolate note to the finish. They gave me a sample of a batch, which had been bottled conditioned and aged in whisky casks. I have it earmarked for Christmas .

By the time it came time for me to leave, the skies had cleared and Alex gave me a tour of the stunning grounds before generously loading me up with plenty of beer to take away including a couple of bottles of seriously strong Alliance, brewed with American beer legend, Garrett Oliver when he visited recently. At 11% it’s practically barley wine and I have been too afraid to go near it yet. But, I do heartily recommend their beers and, if you are not inclined to line up at beer festivals with middle aged, pork pie eating, Jethro tull loving men like DH, check the shelves of your decent off licences or supermarket where they are becoming more widely available.